The Magicians Review: The Wrath of the Time Bees (Season 5 Episode 2)
Margo and Eliot fight to change the past to save Fillory from demise, Alice brings Quentin’s soul back in the form of a golem, and Kady enlists help from Penny to figure out who wanted her memories erased on The Magicians Season 5 Episode 2, “The Wrath of the Time Bees.”
Alice grieving Quentin’s death is an obvious thing that’s going to take a lot of time to get through, but stealing a piece of his soul is an overstep. She wants answers to her questions and that’s valid, but what if in the process of trying to get the closure she permanently messed with Q’s soul in the afterlife?
Alice’s life is in shambles and she’s not thinking correctly, but it doesn’t make it acceptable, especially when she blatantly ignores Julia’s request for help in the séance. If she won’t allow Julia to try to speak with him in the afterlife why is it okay for her to try and bring a part of him back to life?
It’s not an ideal situation, but at least young Quentin answers one real answer for Alice, even if it’s not the one she conjured him for. Alice has been living her life as one big dumpster fire since the death of Q and deep down she wanted him to come back as a kid so she’d never have to get rid of him again.
This is the beginning of Alice’s life and it’s what Q sacrificed himself for. She tries to skip to the front of the page in the book that is her life with Quentin, but that book is over with. It’s time for her to begin anew and focus on what she’s going to do now.
I’m looking forward to seeing the growth in Alice this season and am interested to see what storyline she’ll get. I hope that she and Julia will get closer as the season goes on because I can see real potential in a badass duo type of thing between the two. They’re both badass, powerful magicians who’ve helped save the world before, now it’s time for them to do it again together.
Meanwhile, Eliot is making it hard to love him this season with his actions towards Margo. She’s held captive and still actively on a mission to save her friends before herself, yet she’s “dickmatized” for wanting her loved ones to be safe.
I want to give Eliot the benefit of the doubt and say that he’s changed because he had the monster hosting his body for so long, but I don’t know. It’s hard because he only acts halfway normal with Margo and I feel like he’s only acting in that way to her because he is jealous that she could love Josh more than she loves him.
While the thought of Eliot sending a time letter to Quentin to save his life is exciting, I hope that he doesn’t go through with it. If we’ve learned anything from this episode it’s that messing with the past seldom works out in your favor and is more than likely not going to change the end results.
However, Margo trying to save Josh time after time and then finally succeeding is the cutest thing and I absolutely love it. It’s definitely a highlight from the episode.
Kady’s always helping the hedge witches like it’s her full-time job, but who would want to erase her memories and would go through the lengths of using a sleeper agent to do so? It’s weird but it does solidify my thoughts that she should let someone else take over her position of power because it’s too much stress on her.
Sobriety is an everyday battle that Kady is dealing with and her being relieved at the thought of relapsing is a scary thing for her to have to endure. She doesn’t believe in herself as she should and having to take care of so many things means she puts herself last on her list of things to finish.
I want her to find out who tried to wipe her memories, but I also want her to forget about all of the drama and link up with Julia to try and focus on something else. Saving the end of the world is stressful, but at least with that task, she’s more likely to be around the core group, someone who can help get her through it.
What did you think of this episode of The Magicians? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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The Magicians airs Wednesdays at 10/9c on Syfy.
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Cade Taylor
Cade Taylor is a television and film critic living in St. Louis, Missouri. He is a Senior Writer for Tell-Tale TV. His love for television developed at a young age, with a concentration on queer stories, sitcoms, teen dramas, and science fiction thrillers. In addition, he works full-time as a news producer, telling the stories of Missourians and helming "Produced in the Bi-State," a segment spotlighting actors, musicians, and entertainers from the St. Louis area. He can be reached by email at cade@telltaletv.com.
One thought on “The Magicians Review: The Wrath of the Time Bees (Season 5 Episode 2)”
Interesting take, but I think you are missing just how utterly *broken* the characters are after the loss of Q. Making matters worse for Alice is the recent loss of her father, who she looked up to.
Not only are the characters broken, but they’re *powerful* able to do things few other people can. They can bend reality and perform miracles. But they can’t bring back the person they love. That would be maddening and it’s easy to imagine spiraling out of control from the despair. Alice got closure, and I think Julia forgave Alice quickly, or at the very least has compassion for Alice’s pain.
Eliot, he’s just a wreck. He isn’t handling his grief and regret, and he knows he isn’t handling it, but he doesn’t have the coping skills to avoid the self destructive spiral. He’s going to need a lot of help and understanding to get through this. Thankfully Margo is the right mix to both not take his bullshit, and not lose it when he lashes out.
Of course, all that being said I might be horribly wrong. 🙂
Thank you for the interesting and insightful review.
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